


Oh Such a Heavy Love

by Rochellena



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Light Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-04
Packaged: 2019-05-01 22:04:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14530197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rochellena/pseuds/Rochellena
Summary: Bellamy Blake doesn't love easily.





	Oh Such a Heavy Love

**Author's Note:**

> Finally, after watching and loving this show since its premiere, I've decided to test out the fic waters. 
> 
> There is mention of Becho, so curate your own fandom experience. 
> 
> Title comes from "Don't Wait" by The Duke Spirit, my ultimate OTP anthem.

Bellamy doesn’t love easily. He was born into an environment that made it difficult to love easily. The rules of the ark were strict, rigid, and while that might have been for a good reason, they stripped away some of the warmth and joy that comes from spontaneous or unexpected human relationships and interactions. Even before Octavia came into his world, he saw how his mother was used and treated. His mother made it clear to him that there were people in this life who would always expect something from him, want something from him, but never be willing to share in their prosperity. His mother taught him of power and oppression and the struggle that is eternally waging between the two. She told him stories of leaders and followers, powerful orators and weak men. She taught him to be kind to those weaker than himself and be loyal to those who show kindness to him. 

When Octavia was born, he used these skills. She was his entire world. In their small room, sized for the two people who were assigned there rather than the three that occupied it, he truly learned about love and loyalty. In their little home, there was laughter and companionship, but outside that door was the real world, the reminders who he was to this cold, practical world, who his mother was, who his sister wasn’t. He’s never had the chance to love easily, never been allowed to let his heart grow and travel into the hands and minds of every passerby. 

Bellamy doesn’t love easily, but when someone makes their way past the solid walls and thorny guards protecting his heart, he holds them with an intense ferocity that leaves him completely at their mercy. 

Octavia was the first, was the only for so many years. She was his sister, his responsibility, but in so many ways he was also her teacher, her mentor, her idol, her parent. When they came to the ground, thrown from space by their society, she started to pull away. Part of his heart would always be attached to her, but the widening gap between them, between their experiences and needs, he felt that whole of his world crumbling a bit, leaving his heart a bit more vulnerable.

Over the coming months, through war and betrayal and fire, he brought more into his heart. Miller was an instant friend and ally. Monty and Jasper were kind and naive, reminding him so much of himself and Octavia on the night of the doomed Ark party. Raven was brilliant and broken in ways he understood. And Clarke…Well, these were his people now. Where he used to only have two people, one after Aurora was executed, he now had many. The walls crumbled a bit more, making it easier for others the make their way in. 

Bellamy doesn't love easily. When he loves someone, when he pulls them into his heart, under his protection, he will do whatever it takes to keep them safe. He is wary of outsiders, but the moment one of them makes their way into safety of his heart, he loves them deeply, giving them a piece of himself. Each loss leaves him a little more scarred.

Gina came into the picture; she was kind and clever and brave. She was the kind of person he wanted to be. He didn’t deserve her. He knew that; others knew that. She was light and he was a black hole. There should have been more time. They should have gotten to spend more time with each other, gotten to hold hands beneath a table, held onto each other a bit longer, learned each other, but they didn’t. Gina was real and he loved her.

There was a dark period, the darkest since his mother had been floated. His love had killed Gina, his trust in others, his need to protect Cl-- he had killed Gina, even if he hadn’t been the one holding the knife. Pain, despair, rage all swirling within him. Even then, he didn’t see how his love, love for his people, was fueling him. It wasn’t until later he saw how that had been used, forged into a weapon to be wielded against the enemy. For too many days after, he didn’t know who the enemy was, but assumed it was himself.

Bellamy doesn’t love easily, but he does love completely. When someone makes it past the walls built of fear and loss, over the pools of insecurity and doubt, beyond the scars of trauma and self-hatred, he envelopes them with absolute love and adoration. All past misgivings, unaired grievances, lingering bitterness, resentment, it is all washed away in the simplicity and purity of his affection.

Honoring those left behind, building upon their legacy, was his way of trying to keep the guard to his heart relaxed. Open the gates a bit more, allowing others to more easily reach his soul, it was his way of remembering her, her light, even as he safely tucked those complicated feelings in a golden box, hidden far in the back of a cavernous sadness. Uniting the others, forging a bond between a group of misfits, it’s what Octavia had wanted to do on the ground, it’s what Clar-- He helped build a new family, never forgetting the lessons of forgiveness and empathy learned from the first. 

Echo was just that, an echo of a lost home, lost family, lost place. She was a warrior without a war, a knight without a queen, a grounder in space. He hated her for what she represented, both in the pain she had dealt him and in the reflection of himself he could see in her. He didn’t want to like her. Forgiveness was hard, but he had grown, had learned. He didn’t want to love her, hadn’t meant to. It had snuck on him in quiet moments and common needs. They were two broken ships, tossed together by an unrelenting sea, and in time, they built each other back up.  
One day, he woke to realize that their hearts were attached, even if the bridge between was precarious, it was there and it true. 

When it collapsed, it wasn’t because he didn’t love her enough, it was simply and sadly because he had tried to love in a vacuum, wanting so hard to ignore the blue eyes that stared back at him in this dead world, trying force the lid back down on his locked away memories of levers and hands and feelings left drifting. Echo was stronger than him, a survivor to the core, and knew when the walls needed to come back up. Their relationship faded, but their bond would always be in place. 

Bellamy Blake doesn’t love easily. He doesn’t; he can’t, but he wants to. He looks at they way Harper is able to make Monty understand his importance in her life. He sees the way Kane carefully carries a sick Abby across the field, placing gentle kisses on her forehead with each step. He listens to the melodic humming and gentle words Jackson is sharing with a dreamy Miller. He is surrounded by people who can communicate and express their love in the beautiful, honest ways their people deserve. Yet, she is here, alive, looking at him with worried eyes, and he is frozen.

He had grown up on myths and legends, had been shaped by the colorful characters in those extravagant murals of ancient life. He’d reveled in the stories of triumphant love and tragic heroes, and a piece of him had always hoped that when the children of tomorrow were being told the stories of endless war, impossible decisions, and brave princesses, that maybe he’d have a bit role, not a hero of course, but hopefully not a villain either. He’d never expected his heart to be at the center of a resurrection story. 

How do love someone who died for you? How is anything you say enough? How do you live with knowing you left them behind? He’d tried answer all these questions, tried to live with all of it for six years. A sacrifice for their people, he understood that, better than most in fact, but the emotion, the grief, the jubilation at seeing her run across a long-abandoned mill towards him? The grief and utter joy of feeling her throw her arms around his neck, the intensity of feeling her breathing and sobbing against his chest, it was all so truly and completely overpowering. 

So much between them was new, but everything important was old and familiar. Relearning someone is a tricky thing, especially when the memories and the realities conflict. Eventually, after several arguments and countless heavy stares, they fell back in step. It was the same as it was before, but now, it was so different. There was a fire, an electricity, something that had always been there, but hidden deep below the surface. Every hand-graze, every smile, every spoken word was laden with history and emotion and love. When they finally kissed, he thought he was dying, as everything before-- Octavia’s birth, his mother’s death, the dropship, the first breath of air, the constant wars, the betrayals, the hurt, the loss, the pain, the beauty, the joy filled his mind, part of the journey that led to this moment. 

Bellamy Blake did not love easily, and he was not easy to love. He was a product of childhood trauma, adolescent tragedy, and adult loss. His heart had been broken, shredded, brutalized. He struggled to love himself, and so, thought no one else could love him either. Then, he met her, and things changed, he softened. As time marched on, he learned, he grew, he removed his heart’s armor. Bellamy Blake loved Clarke Griffin and she loved him, and that was easy.


End file.
